Vehicles such as fire fighting vehicles (fire trucks and fire engines), mining vehicles etc include hose reels that may be attached to a water supply in order to direct water onto an area that needs to be doused, cooled down or extinguished.
These vehicles include many pieces of important equipment that are required by the operators of the vehicles, such as fire fighters for example, in order to enable the operators to perform their duties. Therefore, space on these vehicles is at a premium.
Although hose reels on these vehicles may be operated manually, it is preferable that they are operated with the aid of a motor drive circuit in order to feed out and wind in the hose in an efficient manner. Motors are used to rotate the hose reel drum and the rotation of the hose reel drum causes the hose to be fed out from, or to be wound back onto, the drum.
Prior known motor driven hose reel assemblies have used direct drive mechanisms that did not provide a drive coupling that provides an element of slippage. These types of arrangements therefore resulted in an increase in the wear and tear of the various drive components due to the increased force required when switching the drive circuit from a “feed out” mode to a “take up” mode.
It has also been known to utilise a mechanical clutch mechanism to drive hose reel assemblies.
Further, known reel assemblies have been formed from a drum with a bolt mechanism that passes through the entire length of the drum. The bolt mechanism is then used to attach each of two circular side portions to either side of the drum in order retain the hose on the drum. Alternatively, known reel assemblies have been formed from two opposing units, with each unit formed from a half drum and a single side portion. The two opposing units are then attached together at the central point of the drum. Both of these types of assemblies are particularly complex to manufacture.
One example of a fire hose reel mechanism is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,513,772 by Fisher. This US patent describes an automatic hose reel that uses a clutch arrangement attached between the reel and an externally fitted motor. As the motor is external to the hose reel, additional space is required to accommodate the motor within the fire fighting vehicle.
A further example of a fire hose reel mechanism is described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,316,368 by Moon et al. This US patent describes a hose winding apparatus, which includes a clutch assembly coupled to a drive motor. Again, the drive motor is located external to the hose reel thus requiring the use of additional space to accommodate the motor.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,802,336 by Holmquist, a hose reel apparatus is described where the motor is located internally within the hose drum. However, in order to access the motor assembly, e.g. for maintenance or repair purposes, it is required that the motor is completely removed from the assembly via a side mounting plate. Therefore, maintenance of the motor becomes a lengthy and complicated procedure resulting in the fire fighting vehicle being out of service for an increased amount of time.
An object of the present invention is to provide a hose reel assembly that provides easy access to the motor drive circuit.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a hose reel assembly that maximises the space requirements for fire fighting vehicles.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a hose reel assembly that provides a strong coupling and torque connection between the motor drive circuit and drum assembly, which can also provide slippage.
Each object is to be read disjunctively with the object of at least providing the public with a useful choice.
The present invention aims to overcome, or at least alleviate, some or all of the afore-mentioned problems.